Otto Landsberg 1803 – 1905 – Simon de Villiers

This is a fascinating study of a multi-faceted and gifted man. Born in Germany in 1803, he immigrated with his parents and brothers to South Africa in 1818 and died in the Cape in 1905. In his lifetime of more than a century he was simultaneously artist, art teacher, musician and successful snuff merchant.

As late as 1952 an art historian wrote that none of Otto Landsberg’s paintings had been traced and, had it not been for the generous bequest by his grandson Auguste d’Astre of more than 7o of his grandfather’s paintings to the Potchefstroom Museum in 1956, Otto Landsberg’s achievements as an artist might well have been forgotten.